Tuesday, October 30, 2007

Chaos theory as applied to my life

I don't pretend to understand the full scientific ramifications of chaos theory. But its basic premise--that small changes to one part of a system can have big unintended impacts to another, seemingly unrelated part of the system--sure seems to hold true in my experience. To wit: The Husband is sick, therefore I did not wear a belt to work today.

It's not that I intentionally chose not to wear a belt as a direct response to his illness. It was an unintended consequence to a seemingly unrelated aspect of our domestic ecosystem. You see, he woke me up early. That was intentional. I needed to go to the hospital for some blood work (follow up from my recent doctor visit). I had to do this on an empty stomach, which for me requires advanced planning. So last night we agreed that I would not eat after 7:30, he'd get me up early, and we'd swing by the hospital (their lab opens at 7:30 a.m.) and then someplace with food on the way to my office.

But when 6:10 this morning rolled around, he informed me that he'd already been up for a few hours, throwing up. That meant I had to get myself ready this morning, including the ironing, the driving, etc., plus remember to go to the hospital and then get some sustenance. Anyone who knows me well can attest to the fact that I am NOT a morning person, so my success in getting to work on time with proper nutrients and presentable attire is largely a function of his assistance. By the time I got to the office --shirt ironed, blood work done, and Starbucks in hand (I had a slice of banana bread before my latte)--I realized I did not have my briefcase. It wasn't until noon that I realized I wasn't wearing a belt.

I hope he gets better soon. Apparently there's a particularly vicious strain of flu going around this year. Of course it could be rabies; he went out on the deck last night when the raccoon was milling around. Maybe I'll go check for foam around his mouth...

Meanwhile, my dad called tonight to check on us, because he'd heard on the news that there was a magnitude-8 earthquake somewhere in northern California. It turned out to be a magnitude-5.6 quake that happened at 8 p.m., 300 miles south of us. I hadn't heard anything about it until I checked CNN.com while he was on the cell.

T-minus four days until birthday time. I've decided that 37 is the magical age when you transition from "mid-30's" to "almost 40."

Sunday, October 21, 2007

Bud Light Opera Commercial

Saturday, October 20, 2007

So sleepy

So, three of the five pills I'm now taking daily "make cause drowsiness." Uh, yeah... I've been taking a nap every evening after work and before dinner (and Stan's been having a hard time waking me up for dinner), and still getting a full night's sleep. No heavy machinery operation for me.

What is up with college football this year? There's no "upset Saturday"--every Saturday is upset Saturday. I wonder if there's ever been a season with so much churn in the top 25. (And obviously I'm annoyed that my Wildcats lost again.)

My sister e-mailed and said she's waiting on news about my nephew's kid being born. Does this mean his wife is in labor?

This afternoon we went to a co-worker's wedding. It was a really nice ceremony; out of the four weddings we've been to this year, it was probably the one closest to my own vision of a proper wedding. (The soprano who sang "Ave Maria" was great.)

Wednesday, October 17, 2007

Just Great

Well, this has been less than a blue-ribbon week. It's been raining and the dryer in the laundry room won't get anything dry.

Next, I get to go back on a ton of pills. I went to the doctor to get something for the cough (yes, it's still hanging on), and ended up with an enlarged prostate and eczema. (Okay, the doctor didn't give me the conditions, just the prescriptions, but it still sucks to come out of the doctor's office feeling worse than when you went in. Now there's a battery of tests and a follow-up visit...) At least while at Target to pick up the six prescriptions I also got the tenth season of South Park on DVD. Now, I just need to finish watching seasons six and nine before I get to it.

As a kicker, last night the lights in the bathroom and garage stopped working. I finally figured out that we had somehow tripped the GFI. Who would ever have guessed that the garage door opener, bathroom exhaust fan, and electric controls for the furnace would all be on the same circuit?

On the upside, we got a lot of cleaning and rearranging done in the house. Now I want to go buy more new furniture...

Sunday, October 07, 2007

PDX

I guess I should use the free hotel Wi-Fi, since I dragged the laptop along. (I've been on my Q all weekend; new toys are so much more fun than only-slightly-less-new toys.) In fact, we brought FIVE bags for a 48-hour trip. Most of that space was taken up by books to resell at Powell's. Now we have room for all the clothes we bought. (For The Husband; he has been complaining that he's lost so much weight that everything is too big on him now--a problem I doubt I'll ever have.)

I got to read the play-by-play of the last 8 minutes of the KU/K-State game on ESPN Mobile on my Q while we were sitting in the Redding airport. Needless to say, I was not happy.

I was also not happy trying to drive around Portland yesterday. I now know why there were only a couple hotel rooms available in downtown Portland this weekend and they were $280/night. Today is the Portland Marathon. Driving into downtown yesterday was awful; the Burnside bridge is closed and there were barricades set up everywhere. We did, however, make it to Powell's and got $81 in trade credit.

I realized last night that three of the four groups of friends we have up here are people we know from Kansas, and the fourth (from California) are the only ones who live on the Washington side of the river. One of the four is out of town this weekend, but some other friends who don't live here were also visiting last night so we had dinner with them at a pizza place on Hawthorne.

We went back downtown after dinner to go out (since we're in the big city), but we got back to the hotel by midnight. Bars in Oregon are so SMOKY! Today I convinced Stan we shouldn't fight the marathon traffic; we hung around the hotel reading the paper until almost noon, then went to the mall.

Tonight we meet up with the Washingtonians, tomorrow morning with one of my high school classmates, and tomorrow lunch with Stan's friend from Topeka.

Tuesday, October 02, 2007

Blog tapas

A trio of small plates of blogdom...Saturday: K-State kicks (Tex)ass!Props to MB. Worst home defeat for the Longhorns during Mack Brown's tenure. Now, the 'Cats better do the same thing to KU next weekend.Sunday: Proud, but wetWell, there's a reason that June is Pride Month. Here on the North Coast, we have three seasons: rain, fog, and September. But we got sun during fog season this year, so that means "rain" started before the end of September. And since the Pride festival was on the very last day of September, we had RAIN.

The Parade actually got done just as the first drops were falling. We went to lunch with some friends, and by the time we made it back to the festival area, everything was soaked. And the temperature had dropped about seven degrees. There's a big difference between 62 and damp and 55 and dripping, especially when you're recovering from a cold. (Yes, we are STILL recovering; these coughs are lingering forEVER.)

Monday: Ave-new QWell, there was quite a little line at the Sprint Store last night, but I eventually got the Moto Q and The Husband got a Bluetooth headset for his phone. I probably should have gone back to the office last night (especially after not going in over the weekend), but I spent the entire evening playing with all the cool new features. Now I'm having buyer's remorse (over the laptop, not the phone; the phone can do just about everything but play a DVD--although I am blogging on the laptop, so score one for HP).